When I was just 3 years old, evil first invaded my life. By the age of 5, I was thrown into a world of brutal strangers, forgotten by everyone. My story is one of abuse and terror. But it doesn’t end there. Ultimately, mine is a story of hope, endurance, and the healing power of Christian community.

Tag: Safety In Christ

We have so much to lose. We lose it everyday. It’s heartbreaking. Terrifying. We long for safe spaces. There are none. Life that is not what we believe it ought to be. We anthropomorphize animals and share funny memes. Then a real alligator kills a toddler. We make cool places to hang out with friends who are just like us. Then someone who ought to be a friend, someone who has made many visits rains death into our joyous safety. We make safe worlds for ourselves but the unsafe breaches our walls. It creates havoc. Summons terror. Fills us with horror. It’s infuriating. It’s unfair. It must be stopped. But we can’t stop it.Our safe spaces are not safe.

There is one safe space. Christ.

But Christ’s safety doesn’t preclude havoc or terror or horror. Christ sets our paths amidst the scariness. He summons us to walk on the heaving waters. He leads us to Gethsemane where we beg for the cup to pass but it does not.

“If any man would come after me,
let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.
For whoever would save his life will lose it;
and whoever loses his life for my sake, he will save it.
For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world
and loses or forfeits himself?” (Luke 9:23-25)

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On Friday (and occasionally Saturday if Friday is filled with an excess of other activities),100s of bloggers set a timer, write for 5 minutes, and then post the results over at Kate Motaung’s blog, Heading Home. She provides the prompt on Thursday evening. We don’t edit or concern ourselves with whether our writing is flawless or worthy to be seen. We expose our incomplete, unpolished thoughts and words to each other and our readers and tweet them with the hashtag #FMFParty. Join us.

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Your Input Matters So Much

"Your book project stunned and really spoke to me. And the reason is -- as you point out...'If I don’t tell the brutal story, the miracles of healing will not be miracles at all.' I desperately needed to know -- by witness, not just in theory -- that God does work the kinds of miracles you describe. One of the reasons why your story has spoken to me (and I'm sure to people struggling with God's love like I am) is that I would not believe such stories possible without your incredible witness. That is, I would not have believed that it's possible to go through what you have gone through and still be sure of God's love for you and in fact, as you seem to have, be even more certain than someone who has not had such experiences. So one of the reasons your work has spoken to me is your honesty in detailing some of what you have been through. (That cannot have been easy...)" K. Dormandy